What happens when a room full of Home Stagers gets to listen to a superstar cast of speakers from our industry?  Inspiration!  Linda and I had heard this over and over about past EXPO's but you really have to see it and hear it first hand to truly understand just how inspirational it really is.

Home stagers, Real Estate Professionals, and other people interested in learning more about the Real Estate Staging Industry came from all over the Midwest to the Stagers List Expo held at the CORT Furniture Rental showroom on September 29^th & 30^th  in Indianapolis.  Attendees came from places like St Louis Missouri, Lexington and Louisville Kentucky, Elkhart, Greenwood, Greenville, Greenfield, Brownsburg, Noblesville, Roanoke, Crown Point, Ft Wayne, Elkhart, Jasper and the metro Indianapolis Indiana area, Detroit, Grand Haven, Royal Oak, Bloomfield Hills and Richland Michigan and last but not least, Algonquin, Hawthorn Woods and the Chicago Illinois metro area.  Linda and I were able to meet and re-connect with so many great people in our industry. 

Speakers and subjects included:

Terrylynn Fisher, Realtor Veteran and 2008 RESA Realtor of the year from Concord, California spoke about "Demystifying the Realtor.  Service vs. Collaboration".  A tremendous amount of insight into the life and thought process of today's real estate agent. 

Christine Rae from Toronto Canada founder of Certified Staging Professionals and well known keynote speaker, author of the book; "Home Staging for Dummies" shared "The 5 mistakes that stagers make, the 5 steps to turn your business around and 5 market driven trends to build your revenue".  This was a session filled with great insight by one of our true industry leaders.  Christine also gave us two day 2 workshops, "Understanding client behavior & communication to overcome objections" which was a big hit with the group and "Green Business- Future or Fad?  Which was very informative?

Shell Broadax from Stockton, California founder of the Real Estate Staging Association gave us "The importance of joining a trade run association that promotes ethics and high standards" An important look into the reasons why a member ran organization is important to the growth of our industry for all stagers regardless of their training affiliations.  Shell also provided a day 2 workshop on "Advanced Marketing, Networking & Sales techniques for staging professionals".  Everyone found this session to be full of very important information to help them market their businesses. 

Melissa Marro, Founder of First Impressions Home Staging & Training, CSP North American Director, IRIS, Dewey Color Trainer of Charleston South Carolina discussed "Photos-The Final Ingredient".  Very helpful information for a much overlooked part of all of our businesses, and she also gave us a day 2 workshop entitled "Your Portfolio-Creating Imagery".  Excellent tips from a real Marketing pro.

We also had a very insightful session led by TerryLynn titled "Meet the Realtors"   TerryLynn discussed what Realtors really want from Home Stagers, with two area Top producing agents, Chris Castetter, an agent for FC Tucker and Lydia Stauder an agent with the Tony English group.  Very interesting discussion from realtors who believe in and use staging services on their listings.

Vendors who participated included CSP, RESA, Bekins Truck Line, Staging & Redesign, Interiority Complex, Chadwick Construction and a big Thanks to Babette Harpster, Catherine "Cat" Bates and the entire staff from CORT Furniture Rental for being such a tremendous host.  CORT is really being a true partner to the Home Staging Industry here in Indiana and across the country.

Linda and I even held a lunch time question & answer session on building teams!

Thanks to all of the speakers and vendors for coming to the Midwest and providing such great insight to our area stagers.  We are all certainly looking forward to many great years to come.

And last, I wanted to share the following, which is an excerpt from a blog written by Carolyn Stieger, an attendee of the Indianapolis Expo from the greater Detroit area which I believe sums up the thoughts of most of us that attended; 

Carolyn Stieger, ASPM, IAHSP, CRTS, WCR, WWOCAR (We Stage Greater Detroit)

Stager List Expo Indianapolis -  What a great experience today!  The tips and tricks that were shared today were incredible.  Staging is an industry that is so new and there needs to be more education to the public and Realtors to understand how to present our added value as team members to the Realtor listing proposals. 

Listening to Realtors that utilize Home Stagers share their real life experiences.  Top producers with a 98.5% selling price to listing price results, raving about Home Stagers as their team members!   This will be my new LinkedIn request:  I'm looking for Realtors in the greater Detroit (Southeast Michigan) area that want to grow their business and team up with a professional Home Stager.

The value for me to attend this Expo is priceless.  (Being away from my business for 4 days in this busy time of year, was a huge time commitment, a 5 1/2 hour road trip in rain and high winds)   This is the most cost effective, stager to stager networking and industry education event this year in my area!  If you have the opportunity to attend a StagersList.com Expo in your area this year, be sure to attend.  Great Value, Great Experience.